No BS Hiring Advice

Social Media and Recruiting

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The new vogue notion in the media is that social networking can be an effective way for talent to market themselves. It is also the current “in vogue” method to source talent . . . and rightly so.

With so many people online, there is so much information available to choose from . . . were i not for all the work, it would make sense to forgo 3rd party recruiters and do it yourself.

Here are a few ideas that you can employ to help you use social networking sites effectively.

Are you using Twitter to broadcast job openings?

Is your Twitter account connected to your Facebook page and your LinkedIn account?

If you are a recruiter, are you searching LinkedIn regularly for candidate leads (to use it effectively, you really need one of the services they charge for)?

Does your firm have a fan page on Facebook? Do you monitor it for what people say about the firm? Do you list positions there with links to your website?

If you have a LinkedIn profile, is it only constructed toward promoting yourself or does it promote opportunities at your firm.

Have you created a presentation about your firm and why it is a great place to work and posted it to Slideshare.com . From there, you can connect it to your LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook accounts. Add it to Scribd and Docstoc , too.

Do you answer questions on LinkedIn Answers?

Do you use tags on LinkedIn to categorize people?

Do you actually recruit from LinkedIn? You know, use the information that is there and then pick up the phone and call someone?

Have you actually Googled yourself and seen what others may have said about you?

Have you searched groups on Ning to find groups where your target audience might be lurking? Ning is a service that allows people to create their own social network. Search for groups to join or create your own.

Deploying some of these ideas will result in more hires less expensively.

 

© 2010 all rights reserved.

Eight Recommendations to Employ Each Time You Hire Someone

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You care about your work, sometimes the detriment of your personal life, family life and health. So when it comes to hiring someone, what do you expect from them beyond skills competence?

The hiring process should be focused upon hiring someone who is able to perform the responsibilities of the job while fitting in to a firm’s culture.

Too often, managers become derailed by emotions and do not create systems that allow them to learn from their mistakes.

1. Do Not Hire in Your Own Image. In the old movie, Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, Austin fought Dr. Evil who had a clone made of himself name Mini-Me. Mini-Me is Dr. Evil but one eighth the size and played by Verne Troyer.

Too many managers and business owners try to hire “in their own image” only to find the person is not like themselves and then feel disappointed. Try to hire someone who complements you, rather than replicate you.

2. Be Clear When You Discuss Your Expectations With New Hires. Again, beyond skills competency, you need to be clear and accurate about your expectations of performance and effort. Otherwise, how will they know what you want from them?

3. Make The Time to Interview. I know you are busy but no one starts working for you unless you interview them, right? Standardize initial questions to ascertain their skills and do the first interview by telephone, rather than in-person. Complete the interview in 30 minutes and, if you like them, invite them to an interview at your offices, arranging it for as soon as you can.

4. Standardize All of Your Initial Interviews. As much as you may want to like the new hire, it is important to insure that they meet your skills requirements. Determine specific basic questions that you can ask in order to insure they meet your needs.

5. Make Time for Them to Ask You Questions. At the end of each interview, shift the energy in the room by saying something like, “Thanks for allowing me to ask you a lot of questions. As I’m sure you can understand, it’s important for us to hire someone with the right knowledge who fits in with our culture. I’m sure it’s important for you to join a firm where you and your experience are appreciated, too. What would you like to know about us and about the job?”

6. Check References. As much as you want to check the primary references that are offered, try to ask one of them is they could recommend someone who also knows the candidate’s work who you could speak with. These secondary references are often very revealing becaise they have not been coached about what to say.

7. Create a Fact Sheet for Everyone You Interview. After a while, it will be easy to confuse job applicants. Complete the form as you interview and complete it right afterwards and attach it to their resume. These fresh thoughts and observations will help you remember candidates and make a good decision. It will also allow you to demonstrate how you interviewed so that you can replicate the process for the next person you hired if this hire was successful and correct it if it wasn’t.

8. Provide Useful and Timely Feedback. The feedback that the applicant is “too light,” is useless without the details of where their experience was inadequate.

Standardizing your hiring methodology will help minimize mistakes, track your process as you monitor your new employee’s success or failure, and help preclude bias in your decision-making.

Phone Interviews: What Are You Trying to Accomplish?

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As I listen to employers talk about phone interviews, I realize that firms are over-reaching with what they are attempting to accomplish with this initial telephone call. It seems like so many firms are making judgments about candidates that may leave them exposed to accusations of bias–poor oral communications for a person with a modest accent yet in a role for which oral communications are of modest importance can leave a firm open to attack.

What a telephone interview is designed to do well is test basic attitudes, skills competence and candidate maturity and reasonableness.

Here are questions that you can ask to do basic assessments of suitability:

Can you tell me a little about yourself?

What made you apply for this position?

How many years of experience do you have with _____?

What are the major responsibilities you perform in your current or most recent position? Why are you considering leaving your current position?

What do you know about this company/position? What is the most important thing you’re looking for in a company/job?

What is the most significant accomplishment you have made in your career?

What is your greatest weakness/strength? How well do you handle stress? Where do you see yourself in five years?

Ask three to five basic questions designed to assess their actual skills

When would you be available to start? What are your salary expectations? Do you have any questions for me?

What you are listening for is intelligence, poise and maturity. If someone offers immature answers to these questions, reject them. If they cannot answer the three to five concrete skills questions well, reject them. If they have not had the breadth of responsibility that leaves you comfortable, reject them.

Otherwise, plan on meeting with them and others to investigate further.

 

 

© 2009 all rights reserved.

What’s So Good About Team Players Anyway?

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On this show, Jeff looks at the emphasis on “team players” when hiring staff.

 

Listen to the Show

 

Trying to hire someone? Email me at JeffAltman@TheBigGameHunter.us.

Visit my website, http://www.TheBigGameHunter.us to sign up for a complimentary subscription to No B.S. Job Search Advice  Ezine, pay what you want for my books and guides to job hunting and watch hundreds of other videos about job hunting and hiring.

Connect with me on LinkedIn.

Subscribe to TheBigGameHunterTV on YouTube  http://bit.ly/13EP9fa  for advice about job hunting and hiring. Like videos, share and comment.

Listen to Job Search Radio, No B. S. Job Search Advice Radio and No B. S. Hiring Advice Radio in iTunes and other podcast directories and apps. Please leave a great review.

No B. S. Hiring Advice: Bad Employer Behavior

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter attempts to discourage you from engaging in some of the offensive and rude hiring practices she maybe employers engage in.

 

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a recruiter for more than 40 years.

Follow him at The Big Game Hunter, Inc. on LinkedIn for more articles, videos and podcasts than what are offered here and jobs he is recruiting for.

Visit www.TheBigGameHunter.us. There’s a lot more advice there.

Email me if your firm is trying to hire someone.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Pay what you want for my books about job search

Trying to hire someone? Email me at JeffAltman@TheBigGameHunter.us

Do you need more in-depth coaching? Join my Coaching program.

Want to ask me a question via email, chat or phone ? Reach me via PrestoExperts or Clarity.fm

No B. S. Hiring Advice: Bring Back That Loving Feeling

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter uses a reference to an old song to encourage you to romance job applicants again.


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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a recruiter for more than 40 years.

Follow him at the Big Game Hunter, Inc. on LinkedIn for more articles, videos and podcasts than what are offered here and jobs he is recruiting for.

Visit my website, http://www.TheBigGameHunter.us to sign up for a complimentary subscription to No B.S. Job Search Advice  Ezine, pay what you want for my books and guides to job hunting and watch hundreds of other videos about job hunting and hiring.

Connect with me on LinkedIn.

Subscribe to TheBigGameHunterTV on YouTube for advice about job hunting and hiring. Like videos, share and comment.

Listen to Job Search Radio, No B. S. Job Search Advice Radio and No B. S. Hiring Advice Radio in iTunes and other podcast directories and apps.

Pay what you want for my books about job search

Trying to hire someone? Email me at JeffAltman@TheBigGameHunter.us

Do you need more in-depth coaching? Join my Coaching program.

Want to ask me a question via email, chat or phone ? Reach me via PrestoExperts or Clarity.fm

Influence, Hiring and Retention

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Respectfully, you are mistaken if you believe that people join your firm because you have a “great opportunity.” Almost every firm I know makes that claim and, in fact, most opportunities are pretty ordinary.

They amount to little more than plugging a square peg into a square hole for a few dollars more per week after taxes.

Yet people accept this all the time and it begs the question, “Why?”

“What causes people to accept the same tedium at a new organization for what often amounts to a few dollars, rupees or euros in additional wages after taxes?

The answer is actually pretty simple and comes right out of Sales Training 101 Circa 1975:

Sell the sizzle and not the steak.

In this case, by selling the brand your firm represents in the marketplace, you are able to create the idea of hope, opportunity and desire that so many aspire to.

But the next question is once they are there and they know that they are basically doing the same job for a different manager, what keeps someone.

That answer is also pretty simple and goes back to my MSW (Masters in Social Work) days when I was reminded that people are social animals who operate in relationship to other social animals. Your biggest grouch and grump and your biggest introvert are social animals who will still with you because of relationships with others.

Without doing things to bind people to their group, department, manager, peers or organization, many people lose the feeling of being a part of something bigger than themselves and have little to hold them with you.

It is like the story of the platoon or military unit who will do amazing things because they feel the power of the relationship with the other men and women.

Unless your managers do positive things to create loyalty, trust and relationship, unless such behavior is part of your corporate makeup, your staff will be tempted by the next ad they see on the web promising Nirvana or the next recruiting call they receive from a recruiter offering a fantastic opportunity if only they accept this job offer.

These subtle influences often do more than an extra few thousand dollars to solve your staffing problems.

 

 

© 2007 all rights reserved.

Getting Clear With Your Recruiting Vendors

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I frequently listen to junior people in my office gather requirements from clients about jobs they are going to fill.

Sometimes they take the job description orally; sometimes, they receive an email that outlines what the firm is looking for.

Too often, they make a mistake.

They forget to ask you what the interview process will be like.

I don’t mean the names of the people who will be doing the interviewing and I certainly don’t mean the specific questions either (Although if you want to tell me the questions, I won’t stop you).

I am referring to what the people who will be involved with the assessment process be looking for when they evaluate someone.

Now before you say, “They are looking for someone who is qualified to perform the tasks associated with the job,” and before I say, “Bull,” let me give you some examples.

A not-for-profit that wants to know if the people they interview for finance or tech jobs “have a heart.”

The manager at a consulting firm who arrives as the last person to interview senior technologists and asks them to define terms in their resume.

The firm that rejects a temp for an assignment because the job applicant who met someone for five minutes could not remember the person’s name that was said one to them and referred to them as “The Benefits Lady.”

Do you think these scenarios allow someone to be evaluated for their qualifications? I don’t.

So when you speak with a third party recruiter and provide them with a job description, PLEASE provide them with a description of the interview process will be like and what each will assess for, not so I can prepare the job applicant. I want to know this so I can do my job more effectively and qualify the people I refer to you better.

 

 

© 2010 all rights reserved.

Hiring Smarter

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The hiring process in most organizations is broken– it is like much of America today– processed, Pasteurized and homogenized into no little value except to give nimble competitors a huge advantage.

Here’s what usually happens.

A manager submits a job specification to HR and it is written into an ad and/or put out to recruiters, retained or contingency, who run around trying to fill the job.

Managers then interview with dumb questions that do little to evaluate or truly assess. They re-evaluate the spec in their mind but never communicate changes to the people, both internal and external, who are beating the bushes to support them.

All the while, they are asking questions that come from some industrial psychology playbook but ultimately involves looking someone in the eye and guessing whether they can do the job and fit into the organization.

Meanwhile, candidates can search Google or buy my books (or almost any job search book) and defeat what most employers are trying to find out about them. As a matter of fact, many websites offer the answers to many professional questions that your firm is probably asking.

I could go into this diatribe with examples galore from what I have heard from managers who complain about the process instituted about HR and from HR professionals who complain about interview incompetence by hiring managers.

Does this all make a lot of sense to you? Continuing with systems like this sure doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. The solution doesn’t involve throwing out the system except those that are required for government compliance.

There is a simple to implement solution that will allow your managers to hire with greater certainty and hire people with more drive and motivation.


What is a firm to do?

Contract-to-hire or Temp-to-perm.

According to a recent survey, there are now six job applicants for every available job. In two years the tide will probably turn and you may lose your leverage with unemployed labor.

By offering them a contract-to-hire or temp-to-perm offer (I differentiate a contract-to-hire as being a  skilled professional; a temp-to-perm is someone who might be an administrative role) you will have a very motivated worker who will have to prove themselves prior to being hired and your firm will be protected against a bad hire.

If the person doesn’t perform, let them go! A client told me about a mistake they hired recently who just couldn’t deliver what they said they could. The employer is now are on the hook for unemployment insurance and have to start from scratch interviewing.

With a contract to hire, they could have continued to interview as a fallback, just in case.

Plus you can put them on the payroll with one of your existing consulting vendors and let them make a few dollars free. They’ll love you for it. Just make sure there is no conversion fee when you switch them to staff!

© 2009 all rights reserved.

Direct Sourcing Your Next Hire

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“Hi!

“My name is Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter. I’m doing a search for a client, a hedge fund based in Chicago, which is trying to hire two people for full time positions on staff doing Blah Blah Blah Blah.

“I had been in touch with you in the past at a time when you were aggressively looking for a position. I thought I would (give you a call/drop an email to you) to see if you might be available and might be interested in such a role.

“Is this a good time to speak or would it be better if we spoke later in the day?

I have started many many thousands of calls in this way in an effort to recruit someone I have been in contact with in the past.

If I knew this person was not quite right but might be in contact with or know someone who could fit the role, I would change my presentation slightly . . .

“I’m not calling to recruit you but to ask if you might point me to someone who you used to work with at Blah Blah who might have this background; I’ll keep your name out of it when I call them.

Finally, are you collecting email addresses from people you are interviewing or qualifying so you can re-contact them? I’m not speaking of stealing candidates from recruiters in such a manner.

When you are interview someone by phone or in person, collect their email address, add it to your data base and contact them when a position opens that fits their experience. This is a simple technique that third party recruiters have been doing for the almost 40 years I have been in recruiting.

© 2010 all rights reserved.